The blog of a travelling psychiatrist and football lover. Who happens to be a halfway decent photographer. Takes a cynical view of the world

Archive for the tag “nonleague footbal”

A cold afternoon that ended up little over freezing at the end saw an interesting and entertaining game which either side could have won. Carshalton missed a few good chances and also contrived to miss two penalties rather badly. Good value as always for £9.It is always easy being a football critic of course but the difference between the two sides and maybe the chance of Carshalton reaching the play offs, is taking your chances and taking them at the right time. Carshalton played the better football but the scoreline mandates that Chipstead played the more effective football and certainly looked better than a team that was 20 points below Carshalton.

In a month when the cost of football has been high on the agenda of fans with Liverpool fans voting to walk out of a game in protest against a potential £77 ticket cost for next season, and some championship clubs such as Sheffield Wednesday charging away fans £36, it is good to see a non league initiative to pay what you want. Building a fan base takes time but one has to start somewhere and Didcot Town are starting this saturday.

Empty Grounds. Walton and Hersham

Football is an exciting sport generally and live matches bear no comparison with sanitised TV games. Many fans would consider going to games weekly but there is little incentive or collaboration between teams to make this happen. A few non league teams in recent years have given discounted entry to season ticket holders of league clubs, Hampton and Richmond are one example.

Looking at some of the crowds in the lower echelons of the Ryman league for example. On March 8th at a midweek game Haringey Borough attracted a crowd of 22 which was lower than their crowd of 35 last saturday, and last saturday in Ryman North 6 of the 8 games with reported crowds had under 100 spectators. In Ryman South a few crowds were also fairly dire with Chipstead attracting 48 spectators and a similar number at Molesey.

There is clearly room to increase the fan base at many of these clubs. Didcot v Bashley deserves a decent crowd.

By chance the second time in a few weeks that I have seen Ramsgate play. A decent enough game played in a low atmosphere ground with a crowd of 100 in attendance. The ground is essentially one sided now with the condemning of the main terrace stand. Walton have had a mixed start to the season under their new manager Steve Baker and on the evidence of yesterday they are a work in progress but going in the right direction. They played good football and generally were entertaining. Ramsgate played a lot more of the physical stuff and a little less of the football, but nevertheless a decent team. The game got off to a bizarre start as firstly kick off was delayed by 45 minutes due to a major M25 accident. In the second minute Ramsgate had their full-back carried off with what looked like ligament issues. In the fith minute Ramsgate had their number 11 sent off, maybe harshly. Not long after Ramsgate scored and although Walton chased the game it was not until the 80th minute that Walton equalised with a new header from their impressive number 9, Will Turl. He also had the opportunity to score again in the final minutes with an identical move and header but fell just short. Interesting aspects of the game? The referee made any number of errors, do not blame him for that, but why not at least consult with the linesman? The Ramsgate goalkeeper, although competent certainly had eaten some if not all of the pies. All in all end to end stuff and at this level a highly entertaining game.

Something for real football fans to read and mull over the implications for many non-league clubs

In a life of a football fan and especially a non-league photographer a day of hideous weather such as yesterday, is not wanted. Most games were called off and the challenge was to find a game that was actually on. For me this would have represented a challenge to the management of a club that wanted to boost their attendance by getting the word out there that the game is on, or even off. Some clubs did this very well. Respect due to Sutton who even replied to my humble tweet to them about if the game was on. A club that did badly on all counts was Tooting and Mitcham FC. I could find no social media nor internet site to answer my question. The websites attributed to Tooting seem to have been last updated months if not years ago. No Twitter account. No Facebook page. I might add that all these media are freely available and indeed free. Many other clubs did well to update their fans. Lets throw some praise around. Walton and Hersham have both twitter and facebook and their fans knew the night before that the game was off. Horsham regularly tweet game updates during the game.

I belong to a closed group on Facebook related to non-league photography and from the multiple postings there it was clear that our little coterie could have been driven to any game probably on, hence boosting attendances by a few, but multiply this up and clubs could have done themesleves a real favour.

Having guessed correctly that the game might be on I arrived 2.20pm at Tooting to find no information available. Was the game on or off? Turnstiles all locked. No signs. No clues. No programmes. A few stewards appeared, mostly young lads, doing a grand job I must say, of about 13-14 years, who appreciated the issue and went away to solve the problem. Turnstiles duly opened at 2.40pm. A thin paper based programme was on sale from a cheery gentleman for 2£. In all honesty the poorest non-league programme I have seen for some years. I do not exaggerate but I could have printed this off from my computer in far better format. Little to no food was available in the snack bar. A wait for 10 minutes led to a burger. Priced at the not so cheap price of 3.50£. Entrance to the ground was 10£.

The pitch was not in bad condition at all considering the rain .

I will stop my social media rant here, but what opportunities are being missed by clubs who want to boost their crowds. Each week we read that non-league football needs larger crowds but clubs must promote themselves a little better to get new fans. Tooting missed this opportunity big time yesterday.

The game itself was not a phenomenal one. The better side won easily. The reality was that Horsham looked fitter and better, by a bit, but maybe more interested as a team. No players stood out. no one disgraced themselves. Tooting might have felt a little aggrieved that they did not get an equaliser in the second half but maybe this would have been unfair. The Tooting manager in his technical area spent most of the second half swearing badly at his team, with some non-funny sarcastic comments thrown in. Seemingly oblivious to the fact that children could hear each and every of his well chosen words. I cannot say I warmed to him and wonder if his team does. Neither side will win anything this season and neither will get relegated, although on a bad run, Tooting might be drawn into the relegation battle. The low crowd of 155 should however be of concern to the club as based on this performance will not be getting any larger.